Originally posted by jeantherapy
Originally posted by ShadeWolf
My personal opinion is we should just ban smoking altogether. That, or start actually regulating what the tobacco companies can put in them. If they
only used tobacco leaf, I wouldn't have too much of a problem. But I'm pretty sure even the most dedicated chain-smoker will agree that benzene has
no place in a product for human consumption.
Most smokers I see don't seem to be pursuing excellence in any aspect of their life. First of all it's a lot more difficult to exercise when your
lungs can't get enough oxygen to your muscles via the bloodstream. The fact that at no time can I walk down the street without seeing cigarette butts
and wrappers littered everywhere also indicates to me a lack of excellence. I constantly see cigarette smokers doing it with their kids in the car,
sometimes with the windows up. I've been threatened with physical harm for expressing my opinion to those people, which displays their truly
disgusting nature and lack of respect. Many smokers I have spoken with (I even have friends that do it, difficult as it is to tolerate their company)
spend about $10 everyday on this habit and there is absolutely no return on this investment. A buzz that lasts all of a couple minutes and amounts
mostly to a feeling of light-headedness? That's hardly worth it. Oh, but it relieves my tension and feelings of anxiety. Well, that's simply because
you've trained yourself to react that way. You could train yourself to gain the same feeling from a cup of tea or even folding paper origami style.
Whatever problems you have existed before the cigarette and they still exist after the cigarette, so the whole stress relief thing is just the placebo
effect. Oh and no to mention the fact that when you give your money to cigarette companies you are handing your hard earned dollars over to an evil
old man that cares nothiing for your health or well being. It is all of these reasons that I would never smoke another fag in my life, even if I
somehow got the idea that I would enjoy it.
My dear dear Jeantherapy
Please allow me to reply to your diatribe on behalf of all smokers.
1. You state that smokers do not pursue excellence and, in your opinion, have difficulty getting oxygen to their muscles via the bloodstream
Are you aware that there are olympian athathetes who smoke? This is surely a group that can be cited as "pursuing excellence"
Are you aware that smokers make it to the top of Mount Everest far easier than non-smokers do?
Are you aware that there are smokers who work physically demanding jobs, and do so quite efficiently. As a matter of fact, smokers are more likely to
have physical jobs because they are more heavily wieghted in the lower social economic classes. Are you suggesting that a construction worker is less
physically effecient than some stock trader, who spends his day in a chair, on the phone?
I myself have smoked for over 40 years. I go to the gym and lift weights with a personal trainer twice a week, do another session with the same
trainer for core exercises once per week and do cardio training another 4 times per week. And I am in my late 50s.
2. Show me your proof - and I do mean proof (not propaganda and authoritive statements) but actual proof that second hand smoke affects children.
The fact is that the rate of asthma in children has increased 800 % since the 1960s - in direct lockstep with the decrease of smoking in the
population.
Think of it this way - man has always lived in environments heavily laced with smoke from the burning of organic material used for food and cooking.
Our respiratory systems developed in the presence of this smoke for millenia. Childhood asthma was rare - until the 50s and 60s when we started
heating our homes and cooking our food with cleaner burning sources of energy.
Asthma is a disease of hypersensensity to normal environmental contaminants - pollen, dust, cockroach poop, carpet fibers, toxic fumes from building
materials including the plastics used in the construction of cars. etc etc.
The smoke from the burning of approximately 19 grams of dried leaves is a contaminant but a very very minor one in the presence of other
contaminants.
Given the lack of evidence that smoking in the presence of children causes harm - please explain to me - who the hell are you to decide that it is
your place to tell others how to raise their children?
Do you also approach your friends to tell them not to BBQ or light a campfire or light a candle, or light a wood stove or a fireplace in the presence
of their children? Or do you simply consider that smokers alone are worthy of your unsolicited and unwanted comments?
What lack of oxygen do you speak of? I know that smokers have a slightly less concentration of oxygen in their blood stream than non-smokers but
where is your proof that the minor difference affects performance?
Continued ....
